Letters to the Editor: Balancing the long and short term

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I always enjoy reading SD Times to see what is new and innovative. However, in the real world of business, these two traits do not often carry much weight. I was very happy to read this very opinion in last issue’s opinion page (“HTML5’s next-generation browser wars”).

While using the latest technology is great for exercising your mind, it can become obsolete, leave you with code that is no longer supported, or, worse, leave you with code written in a technology that no one can maintain. For existing companies, they need technical answers to problems now; these solutions need to be in place for a long time.

Your platform for rapid application development can be FileMaker, Access or REALbasic. These solutions all can offer long-term solutions developed in a timeframe short enough to produce meaningful software. The key is proper development and understanding of the business problems.

Let’s hope you put your money where your mouth is in future issues when you say, “If you want reliability and compliance, the proprietary RIA platforms are still the best choice.” I hope to see more coverage of these real-world solutions.

I’ve implemented ClearCase branching schemes to support both parallel and agile, and I’ve seen others do the same. Broken builds? That’s the world of waterfall, and again, you assume everyone works on the main branch, which is not necessarily true if you design your branching schemes correctly. Arcane branching patterns? Only if it makes it arcane. Remote development? Not true: Replicas, remote logins, and Web-based access all facilitate remote development. No flexible release cycle? Wrong again.

Many companies are using continuous integration and agile using “yesterday’s SCM systems”. It sounds like yesterday’s tools can’t do agile period, and only DVCTs can, which is wrong.